Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 9:46 am Post subject:
Rampastein's Feedback
Subject description: Don't read if you haven't played the mod yet.
Well, although I've been playing TI since July, I never had time to complete the Nod campaign and I've played only a few matches of skirmish in the public beta version until now. So my feedback comes a bit later.
The campaign missions are fun and diverse. However the difficulty is quite random. I didn't have a chance to beat Nod mission 3 on Hard, and on Normal it was so easy I got bored. GDI attacked me twice during the map before I destroyed it's base. Nod missions 1 and 2 are much more difficult than 3 on Normal, but on Hard mission 3 is impossible. And I had no problems playing all the 5 GDI missions on Hard.
In Nod mission 4 the continous Globotech attacks kept me on the alert, and although the mission was still quite easy I at least had to watch my base for the whole mission while attacking the Globotech cities.
I haven't played Nod mission 5 yet, but despite the random difficulty I've really liked all the missions, expect for Nod mission 3. The first GDI and Nod missions being in the same location is a nice idea.
Multiplayer balance and the sides' differences seem really good, the only thing I'm not sure of is the Banshee bomber. While it sometimes seems to die easily from Railgun AA cannons, it deals very massive damage if there aren't enough AA defences around. I don't think it's overpowered against bases, but it's hard to defend your attacks against the bombers as GDI since the Scatterpacks don't shoot them down fast enough. Nod doesn't have the same problem with it's powerful mobile AA units. Two bombers are usually enough to destroy most of a large GDI force, and the bombers don't usually get much damage because of the low range of the Scatterpacks' AA weapon. Well, that isn't the bombers' worst problem, but it's that they don't have to wait many seconds on a helipad before they can come and finish off the enemies. Their reload time is about 10-15 seconds on the Faster gamespeed.
The AI is also currently broken in MP, which is my largest problem with TI currently. AI players just build units in their bases without attacking at all and wait until I come and kill them.
I'm not exactly sure what's causing it, but I think that the very low TeamDelays value might be one possible cause. The Hard AI tries to build a new team every 50 frames, but it can't build those teams even nearly as fast, and then the to-be-built teams stack and the AI tries to build them all at the same time, so no team ever gets finished. I once had the same problem with the DTA 1.11 AI, but I fixed it by raising TeamDelays. I also tested TI with TeamDelays=1000, and the AI didn't build as many units anymore, but it attacked with the units it built.
Another problem with the AI is that it doesn't seem to focus on a single player. Some of an AI Player's teams attack me, some of the same AI Player's teams attack other AIs. This makes the AI ineffective in large maps.
I find some of the units' voices annoying, most notably the Nod light infantry's, rocket infantry's and the grenadier's. However I can replace those myself.
Overally I like the mod and it really has a "finished" feel in it although it's still a beta. There aren't any useless units or unfinished gameplay-related stuff (like in TSFS with its hunterseekers and clearly unbalanced units), the campaign is fun, the graphics are great and there are a lot of different maps for multiplayer (although it could have more 8 player maps). And the soundtrack is awesome. _________________ CnCNet Client | CnCNet TS patches | More Quality-of-Life Improvements for RA Remastered
Last edited by ^Rampastein on Mon Oct 25, 2010 2:01 pm; edited 1 time in total QUICK_EDIT
For the bomber, I would suggest to give it not one but two ammo. Of course, the damage of these bombs will be decreased by 50%, thus, it needs longer to deal its damage and, additional, it needs double the time to recharge.
But that would be just my suggestion _________________
Think of me as Nordos, 'cause Banshee wouldn't rename me QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 18 Jun 2005 Location: Dordrecht, the Netherlands
Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 4:38 pm Post subject:
MP AI is borked indeed. It was working fine, until something happened I and the other TI staff members still don't know what is causing it.
Speaking about the TI AI: I maybe need to do something on that little bugger again... QUICK_EDIT
Multiplayer balance and the sides' differences seem really good, the only thing I'm not sure of is the Banshee bomber. While it sometimes seems to die easily from Railgun AA cannons, it deals very massive damage if there aren't enough AA defences around. I don't think it's overpowered against bases, but it's hard to defend your attacks against the bombers as GDI since the Scatterpacks don't shoot them down fast enough. Nod doesn't have the same problem with it's powerful mobile AA units. Two bombers are usually enough to destroy most of a large GDI force, and the bombers don't usually get much damage because of the low range of the Scatterpacks' AA weapon. Well, that isn't the bombers' worst problem, but it's that they don't have to wait many seconds on a helipad before they can come and finish off the enemies. Their reload time is about 10-15 seconds on the Faster gamespeed.
The GDI Railgun tank is your answer. It can deploy into a dreadful AA railgun turret, that even Banshee Bombers should avoid. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
The GDI Railgun tank is your answer. It can deploy into a dreadful AA railgun turret, that even Banshee Bombers should avoid.
Oh, I'll try using those. Can't remember much from that massive wall of text called the manual.
About the AI, I wonder why almost all mods have very low values in the TeamDelays key (and why most experienced AI coders recommend such values). While the normal TS values are way too high, I've found out that using very low values like 50 will mess up the AI. My DTA AI has it set on 1250 for AI level 2 and it still produces teams fast but doesn't start spamming units without a purpose on it's base. _________________ CnCNet Client | CnCNet TS patches | More Quality-of-Life Improvements for RA Remastered
Joined: 16 Feb 2005 Location: North America Posts: You cannot comprehend...
Posted: Sat Nov 06, 2010 3:13 am Post subject:
The AI isn't that broken. And I prefer them attacking not just me, but each other. I mean it is supposed to be a free for all. _________________ Destroy to create. All for the hunt to dominate!
It is. I find it about as poor/easy as normal TS AI. In many cases the TI AI could crush me with all of those units which it just keeps in its base, but instead it lets me build a similar army and just waits until I come and kill it. The AI builds a lot of units but doens't use them at all.
DoMiNaNt_HuNtEr wrote:
And I prefer them attacking not just me, but each other. I mean it is supposed to be a free for all.
That has nothing to do with focusing on 1 player ("player" meaning both human and AI players). In normal TS with Paranoid=no most of the AIs focus on killing eachother and usually only 1 or 2 focus on the human player. _________________ CnCNet Client | CnCNet TS patches | More Quality-of-Life Improvements for RA Remastered
Joined: 18 Jun 2005 Location: Dordrecht, the Netherlands
Posted: Sat Nov 06, 2010 9:58 am Post subject:
Compared to the AI we had before, this AI is a piece of cake. The old AI would attack with large forces, and attack often. The current one only spams infantry, and no vehicles (or at least, very few). It also attacks much slower, and keeps using the same teams. QUICK_EDIT
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Rampastein's Feedback
